


raised on the edge of the devil's backbone

by LadyLiterature



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU, Maribat - Fandom, Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Accidental Baby Acquisition, Alternate Universe, Attempt at Humor, Drabble Collection, F/M, Fluff, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, I suppose, Idiots in Love, Jason Todd is Red Hood, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, also not exactly interconnected, it depends, never thought id see the day i wrote that tag, not always in 'chronological' order, wild
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:40:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 2,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27207514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyLiterature/pseuds/LadyLiterature
Summary: in which the author throws jasonette aus at you and then runs awayAUs within include, but are not limited to: accidental crime boss mari, Anastasia au, league of assassins!marinette, and various sappy displays of affection between these two losers[title from the song "Devil's Backbone" by The Civil Wars, which, as far as I'm concerned, is basically the jasonette theme song]
Relationships: Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug/Jason Todd
Comments: 20
Kudos: 165





	1. I'd rather sit here and bleed out than talk about my feelings, thanks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> prompted on my tumblr by anon:  
> "might one inquire about Jason and Mari interacting more in both civilian & hero form? I'm a ridiculous fan of the "one of them got hurt (looks at Jason) and the other has to patch them up while grumbling about them getting hurt" bit from 'for us to collide'? Or maybe Jason's later reaction to finding out /Mari/ was the civilian in the Two Face Train Incident from that fic? Romantic or platonic, your call, I just love them both dearly."

When Red Hood falls through her bedroom window to bleed all over her carpet, she can’t exactly say she’s surprised. Not after the bullshit she went through as a teen and _certainly_ not after the way she first found him behind her building.

“What?” she snaps, hauling off the floor to drag him into her kitchen where his blood will be easier to clean up. “Is my balcony not good enough anymore?”

She doesn’t pretend to struggle under his weight like she normally would, he’s a little too out of it for her to think the useless pretense necessary.

“Gotta keep ya on your toes, Pipsqueak,” he jokes weakly.

It takes twenty minutes to patch up the worst of it, and then another ten before Marinette has sneakily magicked enough blood back into his body that he won’t pass out or die of exsanguination.

Red Hood is awake and alert, but his tongue is just a _bit_ looser than it normally is.

She turned her kitchen island into his operating table, so she just leans her elbows on the part near his shoulder and rests her chin in her hand in order to speak with him. “This is some strange form of teenage rebellion, you know.”

“Huh? What the hell are you talking about?”

“You and Batsy. You come here injured when you and he are on the outs. Are you going to dye your hair to prove your independence next?” Marinette gasps. “Have you _already_ dyed your hair? Is that why you have that ridiculous helmet instead of the mask?”

“Hey!” Hood protests. “It’s not ridiculous!”

Marinette makes a face at him. “It really is, though.”

“And I’m _not_ rebelling,” he continues like she hadn’t spoken.

She stares at him for a long moment. She can’t see past the helmets visor, but she doesn’t need to, really. “You know you can talk to me about it, right? I’m not going to judge you or anything-”

“Thanks,” Hood cuts her off. “But no thanks. I’d rather sit here and _bleed out,_ than talk about my feelings, so.”

She gives Red Hood a _look,_ eyes flicking down to his torso that has eight shiny new stitches in it.

“If you were looking to bleed out, you should have chosen some other random civilian’s balcony to haunt,” she quips, “I’m not exactly the _‘leave well enough alone’_ type.”


	2. the lost duchesse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> prompted on my tumblr by justafanwarrior:  
> "Do you have more on the Jasonette Anastasia AU?  
> This thing's my childhood and i'll love it until i'll take my last breath"

Mari wanted tickets to Paris, wanted to follow the only lead to her past she had more than _anything._

And still, she is not sure if those tickets are worth having to deal with _this._

***

“Do you really think I’m royalty?” she asks Jason, the more aggravating of the two brothers by far. (She thinks they’re both absolutely _wacko_ for believing she might be the lost princess Marinette, but at least Dick was _nice.)_

Jason liked to skip over the line dividing cheeky and charming so much, Mari thought he may as well play _jump rope_ with it. The only think more aggravating than his sharp quips, was the fact that Mari found herself amused by them despite herself.

He may as well have been _goading_ her into retaliation every time he opened his stupid mouth.

“You know I do,” he answers easily.

She twists abruptly, face inches from his as she snaps: “Then stop _bossing_ me around.”

Jason’s mouth opens and closes with his surprise and she finds herself warmly satisfied with his speechlessness. (It is truly an accomplishment. He seems to have a clever comeback for _everything.)_

On the train seat opposite of her, she can hear Dick trying to stifle his laugh as he fiddles with their travel papers.

Then, Jason throws his hands up and pointedly turns away from her. The little pit of satisfaction in her chest _preens._

She’s smug all the way up until the moment Jason all but pushes her off the train to escape the fiery death awaiting her when their train inevitably falls off the broken bridge up ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> based on [this](https://lady-literature.tumblr.com/post/629652932493705216/lady-literature-jasonette-anastasia-au)


	3. don't owe no one your loyalty

Marinette was born into the League through her Maman, not that either hold much loyalty to the organization. (Her Maman is loyal to Talia, second only to Papa and herself. She is the only reason her Maman had not left years ago.)

Marinette is clever, just like her Maman before her, so she knows that being noticed in the League would mean her death. Knows that, if one were to look at her closely enough, they would see her disloyalty.

But, again, Marinette is clever and so she teaches herself to hide in plain sight, teaches herself to only be as noticeable as she must. Teaches herself, just as her Maman had done, to be the perfect little league daughter.

(It’s easy to lie, she thinks, when the truth would mean your death.)

But then _he_ is brought into the League, broken and sad before they turn him violent and angry in the pits. Something in her chest _aches_ at the sight on him in the ring, feral and terrifying as he tears through opponents like paper.

She bears it for only a week before she can’t take it anymore. The time for hiding is over and that night Marinette kidnaps Jason Todd from the hands of the League and _runs._


	4. the lost duchesse pt 2

Jason had known the Grand Duchess Marinette in that way all palace servants had known of the Rascal Princess. She was the Dowager Empress’ favorite grandchild, the prized ladybug of the royal family, a little girl who was too damn _clever_ for her own good.

He’d never met or spoken with her before that night it all went wrong. (Kitchen boys weren’t allowed to talk to Grand Duchesses. No matter _how_ badly one wanted to.)

He’d tried to save her. Keyword being _tried._

He was stupid, running in and risking his life only for her to end up dead anyway.

(He’d tried _so hard_ and still she-)

All that’s left of her now are the whispers on the townspeople’s lips and the glittering box he can never open.

(Needlessly sentimental. Jason should’ve sold it years ago. But _damn_ him, he can’t bear to give it away.)

He thinks the Grand Duchess’— _Marinette’s_ death made him just a bit… bitter, in a way. A little harder, perhaps, than he would’ve been if she’d gotten away. If she’d lived.

But what if’s don’t keep him alive on the Gotham streets and living in the past is liable to get him killed. The Grand Duchess is _dead_ and Jason has the con of the century to plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> based on [this](https://lady-literature.tumblr.com/post/629652932493705216/lady-literature-jasonette-anastasia-au)


	5. crime boss mari

Look. It’s no secret that Red Hood kills right? Whether she wanted it or not, Marinette has half the secrets of the criminal underworld stuffed in her head and more and more gets fed to her with each passing day.

She knows who he is and what he’s done and when he asks her if it’s a problem she almost has to _laugh_.

“I wouldn’t go judging anything against my morality,” she says, secretive and smiling as she takes out the newest batch of scones. “My perception’s not exactly on the human scale anymore.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

She gives him a look. “I’ve watched Paris fall countless times. I’ve seen the same people die—most of the time, those that I love—over and over again only for them to be fine later. I was Chosen by Creation Herself, and there is so little that I cannot do if I wished. I keep a Goddess older than the Earth itself in my pocket, and compassionate though she may be, she is not _human_ and her kindness is not the same. The scale on which she weighs actions and consequences is so far removed from ours that it barely registers. And her scale is one I get closer to using every day I’m with her.”

He blinks at her. “Well, when you put it like that…”

Mari shrugs. “I’m not upset about it. Not really. I’m- I don’t think I was _made_ to be quite human anyway. I wasn’t really made for following those types of rules.”

Jason leans on the counter. Specifically, he leans on that one corner of the island that makes maneuvering around him the most difficult. “Then I guess Pixie was a good nickname, huh? Little miss fair folk?”

Mari rolls her eyes but there’s a smile playing on her lips so he doesn’t think she’s too annoyed at him bringing up the fact that she’s about as notorious as he is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> based on my [accidental crime boss mari](https://lady-literature.tumblr.com/post/629011521807269888/accidental-crime-boss-marinette)


	6. crime boss mari pt 2

Jason has a lot of nicknames for her. Sugar, Sunshine, Pixie-Pop, Minx—dozens of nothing names that are just on the right side of ridiculous and Marinette finds that, despite herself, she _adores_ every one.

Marinette wonders, sometimes, if he spends time thinking them up or if he just spits out whatever comes to his mind first.

She wishes she could find the courage to ask.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> based on my [accidental crime boss mari](https://lady-literature.tumblr.com/post/629011521807269888/accidental-crime-boss-marinette)


	7. crime boss mari pt 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> prompted on my tumblr by anon:  
> "Can you plz do a maribat, cool/hip mom prompt?"

Truly, Marinette thinks, it’s easy to be a cool mom when you have magic and also love and care for your kids more than their first parents ever did. (Some of her strays came by their orphan status honestly, but most were thrown out and _kwami_ does that make her blood _boil.)_

It’s easy to be the cool mom when you run a bakery full of sweet treats and all of your kids were desperate for _any_ food when they stumbled upon your doorstep.

It’s _so easy_ and still, Marinette thinks bitterly, _Jason_ is the cool one, not her.

“Well,” he says, far too amused for her tastes as he winds his arms around her middle. _“I’m_ not the one that tells them to stop eating all the frosting and finish their vegetables.”

“Cause you’re a giant pushover,” she grumbles, whisking the batter faster.

He laughs, pressing a kiss to her temple. “Only for you and the kids.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> based on my [accidental crime boss mari](https://lady-literature.tumblr.com/post/629011521807269888/accidental-crime-boss-marinette)


	8. jealousy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> prompted on my tumblr by anon:  
> "Could you do a jealous jasonette prompt??"

Jason knows he’s a possessive bastard, knows he keeps the ones he calls  _ his  _ close to his chest because he’s terrified that if he lets them go they’ll run.

When it comes to Marinette, he knows he’s twice as bad—he loves her too hard, holds her too close, curls around her so  _ tightly  _ that one day he may just suffocate her.

He knows, one day, she’ll grow tired of his smothering heat and flit away like the aching salvation she is.

She is not his to claim and she is not his to keep.

He  _ knows  _ this.

But that doesn’t mean he likes it.

(Of course, what Jason  _ doesn’t  _ know, is that Mari clings just as tightly. That Marinette, bright and sweet and lovable, loves just as fierce and bloody as anyone else in their line of work.

But, the way she storms up to him one day, dragging his lips down to hers and all but shoving her tongue down his throat in front of all their friends after an ill-advised comment from Roy about his ass, Jason thinks he might just be getting a clue.)


	9. crime boss mari pt 4

The day when Jason is finally trusted enough to venture upstairs—trusted enough with all the magic and the kwami and the kids who aren’t quite _human,_ trusted with all the heart and love Marinette has painstakingly placed into the next generation of Gothamites—he stands in the doorway and just _stares._

Marinette is behind him, and she can’t quite see around his large frame but the longer he stands there, the more worried she becomes. But it’s just- Jason stares because _magic,_ and also because there’s a pretty big difference between _knowing_ someone’s picking up all the street kids in the city and then actually _seeing_ it in front of you.

“And I thought B had an adoption problem,” he says before he realizes what’s coming out of his mouth. “At least he only has half a dozen kids. _You,_ on the other hand,” he turns to look at her, amusement flirting at the edges of his mouth, “picked up an entire _orphanage.”_

“I don’t- They aren’t-” Marinette sputters, red rising on her cheeks. “They need someone to care about them, okay? What was I supposed to do? _Leave_ them on Crime Alley?”

“Most people do,” he says, but more like he’s stating a fact than implying she should have done so.

“Yeah?” she snaps. “And most people would be _wrong._ I have the power to help them and so I will.”

He kisses her then, because he’s wanted to for _weeks_ and he keeps trying to tell her how he feels but she never understands and then she goes and says _that_ and- 

And she really is one of a kind, isn’t she?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> based on my [accidental crime boss mari au](https://lady-literature.tumblr.com/post/629011521807269888/accidental-crime-boss-marinette)


	10. happier with you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prompted by anon on tumblr: "i was happier with you"

Jason can take care of himself just fine. Growing up on the streets and then being raised and trained by _the Batman_ will do that to someone.

He’s good at working alone, likes being alone well enough. Likes the quiet and the calm and the space where he can let his mind go free.

But Jason’s been alone a long time.

He doesn’t _want_ to be alone anymore, doesn’t want to be _lonely_ anymore.

So when Marinette asks him why he came back, well. The admission is easy, even if all the feelings buried beneath it are anything but.

“Because I was happier with you.”


	11. rotten work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prompted by anon on tumblr

“Don’t worry,” she tells him, soft and sweet and only the barest hint of teasing. “I’ll take care of you.”

“It’s rotten work,” he says only half-jokingly. It’s a reference he made on a whim, but it still has that thread of seriousness under his words. Still with that note of warning.

 _(Get out,_ he means. _Run away while you still can.)_

He doesn’t expect Marinette’s eyes to light up with fire, doesn’t expect her hands to find the sides of his face and force his gaze on to hers. He doesn’t expect the words, the lines that follow his, to come from her lips with such passion and honesty that it makes something old and forgotten in his chest sit up and _ache._

“Not to me,” she insists, whispering into the air between them. “Not if it’s _you.”_


	12. crime boss mari pt 5

Marinette, of course, thinks of every one of the kids as her own. She loves all of them with the same ferocity her own mother had for her growing up.

She loves them as all mothers should love their children, wholly and unconditionally. Without expectation of reciprocity or reward.

So when she wakes up on a Sunday, two weeks into May, and finds all her kids clustered around her bed with gifts and cards and breakfast Jason apparently helped them make, she’s not ashamed to admit she bursts into tears.

(And, when Sophia tugs on the hem of her skirt a year and a month later, Marinette gets to return the favor, kissing the tears of joy from Jason’s cheeks as their kids gag in the background.)


	13. dragon miraculous!jason

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> prompted by tiredstarcat on tumblr:  
> "Chapter 10 of Raised on the Devil's Back on Ao3. All I can see is a red dragon curling around Marinette. Dragon Jason."
> 
> same world as chapter 10: jealousy

Marinette is small.

Small and airy and fickle like the birds she’s named for, like the boy who came before her.

But there’s far more than what meets the eye and Jason has long since learned that lesson. (A box on a desk, a too friendly stranger, a choker that contains a _storm-)_

Marinette is small, but that doesn’t make her weak or fragile-

_(He holds her in his hands and feels foolish for trying to capture lightning in a bottle.)_

-it makes her _precious,_ and Dragons, as Longg tells him, have always had a nasty habit of wanting precious things. Especially if they are things they had no business wanting.

**Author's Note:**

> come scream at me @lady-literature on tumblr  
> i promise it'll be fun


End file.
